


The Beginning of Wisdom

by mousagetes



Category: Poirot - Christie
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-21
Updated: 2009-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-04 21:01:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mousagetes/pseuds/mousagetes





	The Beginning of Wisdom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [derora_has_fey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/derora_has_fey/gifts).



"Welcome home, Captain Hastings," said the customs official. He closed my passport and handed it back to me, and that was the moment I realized I was finally back in England. Home again at last.

It was the first week of December, 19--, when I made the long journey to England from Argentina. During the flight from Paris I had been in a proper funk. My thoughts kept returning to an Argentinean joke about the English that I had never understood, something about how the British mind so misunderstands the opportunities afforded by life that, after death, the shades of some Englishman must be more substantial than their own living ghosts. I doubt I shall ever really understand it, but during those hours, suspended between two countries and, it seemed, two distinct and contradictory lives, I think I came close. Throughout my life I had traveled extensively but never settled for long, and in my darker moments during that trip I fancied myself like the aforementioned living ghost who has left behind traces in a dozen foreign hotels, the hazy figure formed in his aftermath more substantial than anything he ever cut in life.

Needless to say, it had been a very long trip.

When I finally arrived in London I felt fit to encounter neither friend nor foe, but imagine my surprise when I found a note waiting for me at the front desk of my hotel only a few hours later. It was from my dear old friend Hercule Poirot. I had wired him before my departure to let him know I was coming, but had not told him where I would be staying because at the time I had not known myself. The dear little man must have called around to likely places until he found me, I thought, smiling. It would be just like him to anticipate my movements and surprise me.

I called that afternoon and my friend greeted me warmly.

"Ah, Hastings, _mon cher ami_," he said, and pulled me forward to plant a kiss on each cheek. "It is so very good to see you! You will excuse the disarrangement of my rooms and come to the kitchen for something to warm you, yes?"

Indeed, when I arrived I had been surprised to find Poirot directing a small team of workmen who were in the process of fixing drop cloths over the furniture and floors in the entryway and the flat's spare bedroom.

"You're having some work done?" I asked as I followed him into an immaculate kitchen.

Poirot nodded. "The other bedroom is badly in need of the overhaul. As is the bathroom, but that does not happen until the end of the month." He motioned for me to sit and began to fuss in front of the stove. "I'm only sorry I cannot offer you a bed here, my dear Hastings, but your hotel is conveniently close that I hope you will be able to spend much time with Poirot anyway, yes?"

"Oh, I do hope so, Poirot, if I shan't be in the way. It's ever so good to see you again, old boy, I just -- I can't tell you." If Poirot was surprised by that outburst he said nothing, just looked over at me and smiled.

"I will be grateful for good company, Hastings. Most grateful. This month was looking like it would be very dull indeed, but now here is my old friend!"

"You don't have a case on at the moment then?" I asked. I had half-expected Poirot to be too engaged to entertain me.

"No, alas, as I said a slow month is to be expected. But now that you are here maybe some little problem will show itself, eh?"

We sat together in Poirot's kitchen and talked for several hours that afternoon, Poirot only excusing himself once for the telephone and again when the workmen exited his flat. We had our tea together and talked about old cases, about new problems that Poirot had tackled only recently, about our old friend Chief Inspector Japp, now semi-retired, and about dear Miss Lemon and how disappointed she would be to have missed me. Never once did Poirot press for details about the nature or duration of my visit to England, and I only said that it was likely to be an extended trip.

It was so easy to fall back into camaraderie and ease with Poirot, and the warmth and comfort I found in that little kitchen quite smote my heart.

"Tell me, Hastings," he asked, "if you will be here through the end of the month, do you have plans for the Christmas holiday?"

We had moved from the kitchen to the sitting room, and from tea to large snifters of brandy by then, and I had to look down into the bottom of my glass for a moment before I answered. As it happened I was completely unprepared for the question: the holiday had simply slipped my mind.

"I haven't any idea what I'm doing yet, as a matter of fact, Poirot, and I was rather hoping --"

"Hastings, I myself have plans to travel to the country," he said.

Oh, right. I had been a bit of a fool to think that a man with as many prominent and devoted friends as Poirot would not already have several invitations.

Poirot had looked at me and smiled in that way he had that made me positive he could see right inside my head. "I was hoping you would be free still, Hastings! If you are agreeable I will telephone to my friend and tell them to expect two."

"Oh, rather!" I said. Of course Poirot would not leave me to molder in London after I just arrived. "That is, if you think they wouldn't be too put out, I would love to go."

Poirot twinkled at me with a hopeful light in his eyes and reached out to give my shoulder a quick squeeze. "I am so glad, Hastings, and I hope you will not mind that we will want to be leaving the day after tomorrow?"

That was fast, but -- "Well, no -- I have some business to take care of in town but I dare say it shouldn't be a problem."

"Excellent, Hastings," said Poirot, and topped off my brandy. "I am sure the country air will be a restorative to my grey cells, and the setting will perhaps be sufficient for unraveling some little mystery or other, _n'est-ce pas_?"

I could only nod in agreement, so relieved at having Poirot step in and act on my behalf from the moment I arrived that I did not think too much about the possibility of a problem that needed solving cropping up on the other end of our shared holiday. Even if I had thought about it, I doubt it would have troubled me: after all, my friend was made for solving problems.

The business I had alluded to that afternoon was dispatched efficiently between three telephone calls and a small stack of letters that I might have put off posting, or even writing in the first place, had it not been for Poirot's timetable. Yet another reason to be grateful for the company of my old friend.

*

So it was at the end of that first week in England that I stood with Poirot on a platform waiting for a train. I remember that while we waited I struggled to find something to say to thank him -- without, of course, becoming overly sentimental and blubbery -- but nothing came. I am sure I mentioned the weather, of all things, and we both commented on the rather fine day London had seen fit to present to us as we embarked for a month in the country, but I can remember little beyond that because everything -- aside from the usual tiny details of the station itself, the sound of the trains being announced as they rolled into the station, and the smell of the crisp winter air that broke between sheets of steam on the platform around us -- was pushed from my mind to make room for that same weightless, nauseated feeling I had experienced during the flight from Paris. Standing there with my same small cases, that had scarcely been unpacked in my London hotel, in my familiar hat and coat again, I was filled with a heavy feeling of dread, and sudden sense of being untethered and adrift.

I was home, but I was lost; I had arrived in England all right, but I was not certain where I had landed. Now here I was on the move again already, destination essentially unknown. It was a frightening sensation and I might have babbled on a bit to Poirot about trains and stations and departure times, and how they compared to those in Argentina and various parts of the Americas. I recall Poirot nodding and smiling politely as if nothing was amiss, though when we boarded at last I felt his steadying hand at my elbow for longer than was necessary.

By the time we were nearly an hour out of London I was more myself. It felt so natural to be traveling with Poirot again, and as we glided through full sun and sunset, through minor towns and then smaller villages, I finally began to relax.

I try to take an unsentimental view of things and present the facts neatly when recounting anything to do with Poirot's cases, but because this was a time when my life was changed so completely I will admit to finding it difficult to stay at a distance when recalling those few weeks. To begin with, Poirot's "hotel" was one of those converted manor houses that cater mainly to traveling gentry and government officials, and I admit that at first I was almost overwhelmed by the the general splendor, by the proliferation of valets and ladies' maids, the elaborate dinner rituals with which I was well out of practice, and by our deep, comfortable suite and remarkable modernized baths that boasted the best linen and honey-smelling cakes of soap as big as ostrich eggs. I did not want to think about the expense of staying in a place like this as anything but an honored guest of the proprietor -- or proprietress, as was the case here.

But Madame Laroche was an old friend of Poirot's. She was some years older than my friend and seemed to look at him with the indulgent, amused air an older sister reserves for a precocious younger brother. I liked her immediately, and no less so when it seemed that by inviting us she had dropped Poirot and myself right into the soup of another mystery.

*

"But how did you know, Mr. Poirot?"

The question was one I had heard many times over the years, and it was not the first time it had echoed in my own mind as it was spoken aloud by a guilty or distressed person who found themselves at the mercy of Hercule Poirot.

His answer surprised me. "To be honest, Madame, I knew very little until I spoke to your brother earlier this evening."

"Her brother!" I broke in. "You mean to say --?"

"Yes, Hastings, Lady Carrington was not waiting to fly away with a lover as you surmised. Mr. McKenna is the lady's younger brother, a somewhat foolish young man who has built up the serious gambling debts in recent months."

"Well," said the lady. She looked down at her lap where her hands were worrying a handkerchief of very fine linen. "Now that you know, what do you intend to do?"

The lady in question, one Mary Carrington, was the much younger wife of Sir Walter Carrington, the eighth Earl of Albemarle. When we first met them, only a few weeks ago now, I had been struck not only by the difference in their ages, but also because they were not at all as I had imagined: the society pages had made them out to be an ideal couple, perfectly matched in love and in life -- an assumption I had set aside very early in our acquaintance.

We were, all four of us -- myself, Poirot, Lady Mary and her unfortunate husband -- guests at Madame Laroche's for the Christmas holiday. At the start I thought it was only a whim of Poirot's that brought us to the country, but that proved not to be the case. I should always pay close attention to his hints about little problems and mysteries. That is not to say that I would not have come -- to the contrary, I would have followed him regardless of any danger or mysterious agenda -- but I dare say I would have been a little more prepared for what did happen.

To start there had been this magnificent place and its few holiday guests, including the aforementioned aged Earl and his bejeweled Lady, and clandestine meetings between said Lady and an unknown man. Then there was a bearded stranger peering in at her while we dined one evening, and finally the suspected poisoning of the Earl. All of which had happened in less than a fortnight, the latter having occurred only hours previous, and I admit I was exhausted (and a little thrilled).

Poirot had been his usual indefatigable self the entire time, unruffled and serene even when poor old Sir Walter collapsed in pain and had to be carried to a ground floor suite to recover. Of course his wife was at his side throughout. The village doctor was summoned but a young nurse appeared instead, her presence unquestioned because she had been a familiar face in the village for the last two seasons. Food poisoning was diagnosed, to the horror of our hostess and her inimitable staff. Then Sir Walter slept, the other guests retired, and all through that final evening's drama Poirot watched but did not speak, until at last he had said to me, "Stay here, Hastings, and be vigilant. I am going to the village."

And off he went. All I could do was stand at the ready, but ready for what I still had not known. As usual Poirot had told me almost nothing. But to my surprise I found that I did not care. I was with Poirot, on a case again, thinking on my feet again instead of about what a jolly mess I had made of my life. All of a sudden it was as if I could feel the ground under me again, solid and real, and it was all I could do not to let loose a little whoop of joy. But that would not do: it was Christmas Eve, some time before midnight. The other guests had gone to the village church or retired for the evening, and Poirot had told me to be vigilant. So vigilant I would be, even if I had no idea what was in the offing. Did Lady Mary poison her husband? I suspected that she had. If that was true, should she be left alone with him even for a moment? And where was her mysterious young man? Had Poirot gone to fetch the police?

I had stood in the darkened hallway for an indeterminate amount of time, my head abuzz with questions, feeling merrier than I had in months, when I heard a sound coming from the direction of the room where they had stowed his Lordship after the poor man collapsed. I waited and watched, trying not to make a sound, and was shocked to see Lady Carrington herself enter one of the front rooms and begin to unlatch the windows. What on earth?

I had taken a few slow steps in her direction, not sure whether I should stop her or not, when she turned and saw me. She let out a small gasp of surprise and froze, as did I, neither of us certain what to do. Then Poirot's voice sounded in the room -- "It is all over, Madame!" -- and we both flinched when he turned on a light.

Now she sat before us, apparently very guilty of _something_, rending a handkerchief and asking my friend what he intended to do.

"That depends on you, Madame," answered Poirot. "When I spoke to your brother I also took from him this --" he produced a compact pistol from his coat pocket, "-- and wonder what you think he meant to do with it."

The lady paled and put a hand over her mouth. "I had no idea Freddie even had a gun! Even if he had it he would never have used it, would never --"

"Never what, Madame? Have murdered your husband in cold blood while he slept?"

"No!" she said, and I thought she looked genuinely horrified. "He would never hurt Walter! Freddie wouldn't hurt a fly, he doesn't have it in him! M. Poirot, I swear we only wanted to stage a robbery. My jewels --"

"Would have paid your brother's debts, I know, Madame, but I had to be sure. The gun --"

"I didn't know he had a gun, I'm shocked Muriel let one into the house!"

"I believe you," said Poirot, and pocketed the weapon. Once it was out of sight Lady Mary seemed almost to wilt with relief.

"Madame, he may have only had the gun for show, as he said when I relieved him of it --" Poirot smiled slightly, "--but he is a hothead and may have shot someone in a panic, and then your simple theft might have been a deadly murder."

The lady nodded wearily and let her head fall forward into her pale hands.

"Hastings," said Poirot. "Please give her the small brandy. And then I think we should all be going to bed."

"To bed?" said the lady, and took a small sip from the glass I gave her. "But you haven't answered me, M. Poirot. What do you intend to do?"

"I have already done it, Madame. I have ascertained the truth from the young man your brother and his fiance --"

"Fiance?" I said.

"The nurse, Hastings. The woman who was here earlier to treat his Lordship in place of the doctor."

Lady Mary nodded again. "Yes, Muriel gave Walter something so he would sleep through the night. He's a light sleeper and would have wanted all his things with him, including the case with his papers and all my jewels. She gave me her word that he would be fine by morning. I think she was really very upset by this. If anyone's to blame it's me, and Freddie, not that poor girl."

"Indeed, Madame, but it was also Mademoiselle Muriel who gave to you the poison to lace your husband's coffee."

"But only to make him sick! I never wanted to hurt him, you have to believe that." She blanched and took another sip of the brandy. "If I had known just how ill he would be I would never have let it go this far."

"I think that is the truth, Madame. Your face when he was taken ill told me this."

"So that's it? You just wanted to know, and to stop Freddie coming and taking my jewels?"

Poirot inclined his head and held out his hand to her, which she took at once.

"I also want to give you a small piece of advice, Madame: talk to your husband. Tell to him all."

"But --"

"It is only advice, _miladi_. You can take it or no."

"I will think about it, M. Poirot. Thank you." She rose and moved to the door. "Captain Hastings, good night."

"Good night, Lady Carrington," I said.

When she was gone Poirot turned to me and sighed. "Well Hastings, a long day, no?"

"I'll say. Are you going to explain it all to me, or am I going to have to guess?"

Poirot smiled at me fondly. "I will explain all. Call it a Christmas gift, my friend."

I laughed. So strange that I should feel so good after what had just happened. "Some gift, Poirot! But Happy Christmas."

"Happy Christmas, _mon cher ami_."

As we ascended the stairs to our suite he told me no more than I had guessed, that Lady Carrington had come to this hotel for the express purpose of staging the theft of several of her necklaces, which would be turned into cash to save the neck of her rash young sibling. He had been living in the village with the girl he planned to marry.

"He told me the moneylenders were closing in, Hastings, so they had to act soon. At first the boy and his sister planned a very simple theft -- Mary Carrington would make sure an outer door was unbolted and that her own door remained unlocked, and then _voila_! The boy strolls in an steals them. But then there is the snag: you remember of course when the lady screamed and said a face is peering in at her at dinner?"

"That's right," I said. "The bearded man! Who was he, Poirot?" We had all raced outside at the time, but had seen no one.

By this time we were seated in front of a fire again, and though it was rather late I doubt either one of us was very tired, strain of the day or no.

"He was no one, Hastings," Poirot said. "A fabrication of Lady Mary's to lend weight to the possibility of a burglary. If someone had been staring in at her through the window when she is wearing a valuable diamond necklace this would add to the idea that the robber was an opportunistic vagrant. But it backfired on her, you see."

"That's true," I said, suddenly realizing the significance of this. "If she hadn't felt threatened Sir Walter wouldn't have locked up all her jewelry in his own case!"

Poirot beamed at me. "Precisely, Hastings, and then they would not have had to alter their plan to include the poisoning." He shuddered. "But as it was they had to find a way to separate the man and the box so the boy could slip in unheard."

"Good lord."

My friend grunted. "The good lord has nothing to do with this affair, Hastings, and do you know what bothers me most?"

I shook my head and got up to pour us both a little something as Poirot continued.

"That it was completely avoidable!" He said. "The jewels of Lady Mary were undoubtedly purchased by her husband, but they were given as a gift to her, and as such they were her own property. You comprehend? If she felt the situation was so desperate -- and surely the welfare of her dear brother was worth a little domestic strife -- she would have been perfectly correct to hand them over to him at any time."

"Maybe she didn't realize."

"Perhaps. But then she is not that silly. Consciously or not she forced this drama, and for the worst reason possible, I think: because she was bored and unhappy."

"Oh, Poirot, I can't believe --"

"But I do, Hastings. I do. It is a serious fault among young people today that they have the most ridiculous notions about life and love, especially those who are blessed with as much leisure time as your English aristocracy. When we sat at dinner, did you not hear Lady Mary describe her husband as a knight in armor, or so he had been when first they met?"

"Yes, but surely --"

"--and in reality, what did our good hostess call him? The most boring man alive, yes? That might have been the exaggeration, but it is true that Sir Walter is not a knight gallant of the storybook romance."

"But to go to so much trouble when there was a simple solution to her problem seems ludicrous."

"Well, I could be wrong, Hastings, and it is always possible that the good Lady Mary was also thinking of the insurance money, but I fear our holiday was nearly spoiled by the fancy of the unhappy person who wanted to insert into her life an element of adventure -- to rattle the cage a bit, no? -- and for that I am sorry. It has distracted us."

Poirot peered at me intently then and I realized that something was still nagging at me.

"Poirot," I began carefully. "There's just one more thing: before we left London you said you expected a mystery. Did you know about the Carringtons? Did Madame Laroche see a hint of something fishy and invite you down here for that?"

"No, my friend. I knew nothing of them before we came here. I brought you here to answer a question, that is true, but not the one put to us in that _mise en scene_." He paused. "But let us speak again of these notions of life and love, Hastings."

I put down my drink and waited as my friend began to speak very softly.

"There is a -- how does one say? -- a glamour cast over love in fiction, and in your society pages that people put so much stock in, and that is fine if one knows the storybook romance for what it is: a cheap, uncomplicated lie. But alas not everyone knows, and so mistakes are made with lives that are real. That is but human, _n'est-ce pas_?"

I nodded, and all at once my head felt very heavy on my shoulders. Poirot continued:

"They think that because a prince is handsome with a perfect smile and the princess is good and chaste that they will have the happy ending, but _mon ami_ you and I know it is not always so. After the lights they come up there is the every day -- the common things -- yes? The porridge for breakfast and the washing up afterward, the long days and the money troubles, and these things the foolish young hearts cannot abide, so the glamour it breaks down, and Cinderella? She sits in the ashes again, _mon cher ami_, this time with her prince who is maybe not a prince, he is just a man, and will they love each other now? It is unlikely, _mon cher_ Hastings, because it is possible they did not have real love for each other at the start."

I was nearly undone now. The fact that Poirot had employed 'Cinderella' in his analogy could not have been a coincidence.

"You know, don't you?" I said. "About Dulcie, the divorce, everything."

"Yes, _mon cher ami_. As is usual, Poirot knows all."

"But HOW do you know?" I demanded. I had hardly been my usual self, but I could not have been as easy to read as all that.

"From your wife. She wrote to me before your return to this country."

"I see." I did not see, not really, but what else could I say? It had all got a bit beyond me. Though that he had known about my troubles and said nothing was typical of Poirot.

"And now you will sell your ranch, and you are here in England to stay?" he asked.

"Yes," I said, and tried to smile. I had seen to the last of the arrangements by post before we left. "I suppose I'll be able to afford a jolly nice flat now."

Poirot smiled and gave a little Gallic shrug. "Or you could stay with Poirot," he said. "The work on the flat will be complete when we return to London." He twinkled at me. "I have seen to this."

I goggled at him, suddenly understanding. "Poirot, you really are the limit! You mean to say you planned all this -- booked us into the hotel weeks ago, arranged to have that bedroom redone -- before I even arrived in the country?"

"Indeed, I did these things _mon cher_. You do not approve?"

"It's not that so much. I appreciate the effort, and I'm grateful, truly. But it does make a chap feel a bit manipulated."

"Oh no, Hastings, my good friend," he said. "Do not mistake this. For me it was only _bon chance_. You made the decisions for yourself, and Poirot could only wait and wonder."

It was true, and staying with Poirot -- essentially slipping back into my old life -- sounded easy. "Can it really be that simple, Poirot? Should it be?"

It had been very hard to leave Poirot in the first place, to abandon England, my home there, and all we had built during our years together, always investigating one case or another. But at the time I believed in myself and in the golden future I hoped to build with my new wife.

One wonders always what one's life might have been like if a corner was turned too late, or even too hastily, and agonizes over the pains one may have to take to correct a failure or extreme error in judgement. This has been doubly true for me ever since the war; I have been very aware that time is short and must be spent with care, so when I made the decision to marry Miss Dulcie Duveen it was with the hope that this was real love, that the companionship I had thought I lacked would be found with this one perfect, perfectly sweet young girl: my Cinderella. Sadly, only weeks into our marriage we had both known it was folly. But I had refused to admit defeat so fast.

"Dulcie saw sense first," I told Poirot, "said she missed her sister and the life they had as traveling entertainers, and she wanted to go back. She told me there was no harm done by admitting our mistake, and that she wanted to get out while she still liked me. But I wouldn't have it, said we should try to make a go of it, and asked her for another six months. All married couples have their troubles, and why should we be any different? We owed it to ourselves to at least try, I told her, but now I think I was thinking more about the ranch and making a go at that -- I always had a hankering to be a farmer, you know." Poirot nodded slowly. "Now I know it wasn't fair to the girl. I spent so much time on the ranch and didn't really try to get to know Dulcie. In the end we hardly spoke, and when we did it was cold and terrible. I could see that she was miserable but the first time she asked for a divorce I said no. I shouldn't have been surprised when she left, but I was -- it all seemed to sneak up on me."

Poirot moved closer and put one of his hands over mine. I wanted to move away, but I froze in place. It was finally time to come clean, to face the music, as they say.

"But that's not the worst part, Poirot." I took a shaky breath. "When I saw Dulcie's note, when I found she'd left for good, left the country even, I -- oh, it's so cowardly --"

"I am listening, _mon ami_."

"I was _relieved_, Poirot. Can you believe that? All those months for nothing, all those months and I did nothing but wait. She was the one with the backbone, not me. I've been so ashamed."

Poirot's eyes were a very sharp green in the firelight, and he looked so ready to issue a reproach that I was shocked when he smiled slightly and squeezed my hand. "Well then, Hastings, the mystery is solved, and all shall be well."

"What?"

"It is a mishap, my friend, not a tragedy. You do not have the broken heart as I had feared. It is only bruised, no?"

"How can you say that?"

"Because it is true, _mon ami_. This has been difficult for you, but all will be well now, you shall see."

"But, Poirot. I expected you to be angry, or to tell me I'm wrong, I --."

"Angry? No, no, _mon cher_. I am only glad you made the decision to come to this country at once rather than languish at your ranch alone. If you had done so, then maybe Poirot would have been angry, but now? I am only, as you said, relieved. And also in debt to Madame Hastings."

Poirot moved to the small sideboard to pour us each another drink, and when his back was turned I stole the moment to collect myself, taking a few deep breaths and swiping my hand over my eyes. Maybe it really would be all right; maybe I would not always be such a fool.

Poirot, as if reading my thoughts again, said "Do not worry so, _mon ami_, sometimes the end of an affair, it means the beginning of wisdom."

He was right, of course, and while my brief marriage was certainly not the last mistake I ever made, it was the last time I was ever mistaken about matters of the heart. From that day to this I have never suffered for lack of love.

That could not be said for the Carringtons, whose public separation was detailed in the newspapers for months after the New Year. I believe Lady Mary eventually moved to the continent, and I wish her well. The lady's brother had better luck, at least in love: he was able to marry the girl from the village after all, and though they have often been poor, I believe they are still together.

As for my former wife, when I did see her again, years later and in the company of a new husband and children, with her outward beauty dulled by age and care, the disappointed girl I thought I had wronged was nowhere in sight: she had grown into the kind of person whose kindness could be felt across a room, and when we looked at each other I found that the embarrassment and shame I felt when I thought of her in those early days after the end of the marriage had been replaced by something else, a feeling warmer and infinitely more respectful than any emotion that had passed between us when we were husband and wife. Dulcie may have another name for it, if she thinks of it at all, busy as she is, but I call it friendship. Or, if I am honest, _love_. For I may have cared for her a great deal back then, but I can say that I love her now, truly, because she had been the one to finally send me home.

END


End file.
